Blue Bird Winter Card

 Blue Bird Winter Card

I am posting this a little early because I know some people can't make it to class:

Here is the project for Nov. 20:

The reference for this is from Carol Locey, a member of the class with photographic talents.

She agreed to let me teach from this reference. Thanks, Carol! She used AI to substitute the branch for pine and put snow in the background. 

Step 1: Draw and ink the blue bird. I drew an oval around it to give it some emphasis. (But you don't need to do that)

TIP: I drew the oval in watercolor pencil so the color would just dissolve into the background.

You can position the oval vertically or horizontally, to give the picture a different effect.

I made sketches in different sizes, so choose small if you want a card size, large for a 9 x 12.

Make sure you add the details you want to include in your drawing. For example,  Carol wants to put a Santa hat on hers!

Step 2: Spatter some masking fluid onto the background for snow.  You can also mask out a few areas where pine needles will show through the snow. Lightly paint the breast with a gray (I make mine from burnt sienna and French ultramarine) watered down, with some ochre or raw sienna added to the bottom. Add some popcorn salt to the bottom

When dry add a layer of blue to the head and a layer of orange to the body. While the orange was still damp, I dropped darker orange (quin burnt orange) into that area to give it dimension. (the blue can be cerulean or Pthalo or manganese)

Make a gray for the background and paint the background with that gray. While wet (but not puddly), drop in table salt to help create snow effects. Don't go too heavy on the salt. You might try using larger salt for the clumps of snow area around the branch, but you can always add a little snow later. 

Tip: Your background color needs to be a value dark enough to show up the salt, but light enough not to overpower the bird. I made my gray with French ultramarine and Burnt sienna so that I could warm it up with some burnt sienna. But you can choose the color for your background.

I added some large clumps of snow with bleed proof white and spattered it onto the background. When it all dried, I removed masking, darkened the oval with blue, and added some pine needles in the snow. 

I thought there were just a few places I wanted to shadow the large clumps of snow, so added some shadow to the snow on the branches.

If you are doing this as a card, you can either use a 5 x 10 piece of paper and draw the picture on the RIGHT side of paper, so you can fold it up and have an instant card. Or you can just do it on a 5 x 7 piece of paper and mount it with double sided tape to card stock.  When doing it as a card, I usually tape it down to a small board to make a border and keep the edges clean. 

Can't wait to see what you all create!